It's the fall that's gonna kill you
by katmiller
Summary: CONTAINS SPOILERS. Nico/Dani, following end of season 2. Rated M for future chapters. For plot purposes I needed to postpone the timing of Ray Jay's departure a day or maybe two. Slightly AU. First fic. Please review. A/N. DISCLAIMER: I don't own them. Just borrowing. Ps. I am not a native English speaker and I'll probably use some British inadvertently.
1. Chapter 1

"Mr Careles. Going somewhere?"

"As a matter of fact I am."

"Not just yet. We have something we need to discuss with you. You'll need to come with us."

§§

**Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC), New York **

Spending time in a holding cell with two unpleasant sweaty NYPD detectives isn't exactly how Nico pictured his night would go. After the game, after he talked to Mark Cuban, he'd called Xeno and asked him to go to his house and prep his travel bag - he was planning on driving to Dallas that same night, hoping the nightly drive would clear his head some, although he knew it would do nothing to relieve the sensation that his heart had just been yanked out of his chest.

Yet, here he is.

"Am I officially being charged with something?," he'd asked the detectives.

"We have some questions we would like answers to," the taller one had said. "Really, sir, it's in your best interest to accompany us to the station."

He had and once they had him in a holding cell things quickly became clear. They only needed to mention the name 'Mrs Pittman' for the shoe to drop.

Nico isn't worried - yet. The charge is a joke - even the detectives know it - but it looks like he's not going anywhere until he gets his bail hearing the next day. He sent a quick text to Xeno from the car before they took his cell, and he's called Devin - the lawyer owes him quite a bit of favors, so he has no doubt he'll be there first thing in the morning. Now he's got nothing to do but count the hours until morning - in the dark, with little hope of sleep and no distraction and Nico thinks it must be the worst kind of timing to be left alone with nothing but the thoughts in his head. Thoughts of Gabrielle, thoughts of Dani, and the impossible mess he seems to have created for himself involuntarily. He wants to focus on Gabrielle, on his anger towards her, come up with a battle plan to outwit her, to hit her back as hard as she's trying to hit him now but his focus keeps getting lost. Some thoughts have glue on them. They keep coming back. It's a line out of Smilla's Sense of Snow, one that rings especially true when it comes to his thoughts of one Doctor Danielle Santino, therapist of the New York Hawks and - if tonight was anything to go on - the re-appointed girlfriend of the Hawks' general manager.

He's gambled. He's lost. It's an entirely new position for him. It's not that Nico Careles has never gotten a no from a woman before - he's just never gotten one when it mattered, he never put his heart on the line when he wasn't a hundred percent sure of the outcome.

But the thing with Dani Santino is that she has a way of disarming him, and she has since day one. Sassy, sexy, tough-talking, funny, lovable, kind, impossible creature that she is. Somehow, at some point, seeing Dani go full Santino about anything or against anyone had become the highpoint of his working weeks. It's been the main reason why he keeps sneaking up on her or pushes her buttons deliberately, just for the amazing pleasure of seeing her fly off the bat.

Nico groans, rubbing his palm over his forehead. He's in enough of a state for his eyes to sting, especially at the idea of Matt and Dani together like… right now. She just wasn't ready, he thinks. Maybe she's lying to herself, refusing to see what his gut tells him is so obviously there. Or maybe she really does love Donnally a whole lot more than he's reckoned. It doesn't matter anymore. It's game over. He loves her. He wants to protect her. But she's decided it's another man's business. The sooner he can get to Dallas, away from the Hawks, away from her, the better.


	2. Chapter 2

Once he's dealt with the press Matt takes Dani to dinner. Dani chuckles as Matt pointedly starts eating all the bread sticks on the table, looking like a naughty schoolboy. They trade notes on the game, the aftermath of Rex's coming out.

"It will be fine, you'll see," Dani says, "and besides, in a week the press will find something else to go crazy about."

"I don't know, Dani. I think this might be a bigger deal than you realize. First football player coming out - it's history in the making. And, don't get me wrong, I'm all for it. It shouldn't matter. But there are still a lot of very conservative people in America, and a lot of them are football fans… I just wish for once we could have the spotlight about something that's actually sport's related, you know."

"Yeah, but I'm really happy for Rex all the same. It must have been so horrible for him, having to hide who he really is."

"You really care about them, don't you? All of them…"

"Of course I do. They're my patients. It's my job to help them." Dani wants to say more - about how she finally feels she's reached a point of professional fulfillment, how she'd given up on that years and years ago, when she got pregnant and then when Ray subtly manipulated her into always putting him first. She remembers Dr Gunner had been furious, way back, when she'd been accepted for not one, but two doctorate programs and decided to do neither and start a family instead. "I understand you want to take some time off, with the baby and all, Danielle," he'd said, "but why not come back after a year or so. The doctorate program will be tough, even more so in combination with baby care, but if anyone can do it, it's you." But that had meant Ray would have had to cut back on his hours as well and the mere suggestion had made him bristle and half imply she was going to be a bad mother if she put her career before her family. So she hadn't.

Presumably Dani's squinting, because Matt throws her a puzzled look, but before Dani can voice the thoughts that rankle on the inside of her brain Matt's leaned over to press a gentle kiss to her lips. It's enough to send a warm, fuzzy feeling up her spine, to have her smiling, and Dani reminds herself that this is what she wants. Matt. The man she loves. The man she can have. So it's easy to sit through dinner talking and smiling and touching, and later it's easy to take Matt home - the kids are still at Ray's - and into her bed. Making love to Matt is easy too, lush and familiar more than frantic and hot. She ignores the fact that part of her feels numb, pretty much the same way she ignores that brief moment in which Nico's face flashes in front of her eyes and how making love to Matt is nothing like the frantic, ferocious lust that had overpowered her that night, that had made her lose all sense of control, made her feel greedy and possessive as she was dragging Nico up her stairs.

Later, Matt has dozed off in post-coital bliss and Dani thinks, pressing her cheek fitfully against the warm hollow in her pillow. She thinks about what she said before - I'll have his baby if that's what he wants - tries picturing herself pregnant again, giving birth to a tiny creature with Matt's nose and her eyes. The image doesn't do much in the way of sparking an emotional reaction, doesn't make her feel nervous and simultaneously giddy with joy the way it had when she first found out she was pregnant with Ray Jay, but she knows she will love it all the same. Once she has felt it grown inside her, once she has given birth, she will love it and they will be happy, she will have a complete family again. Dani smiles and looks over her shoulder at Matt, who has a content grin on his face and is breathing gently in his sleep. "I love you," she whispers to his sleeping form, and presses a light kiss on his shoulder before she settles herself against his chest.

Dani dreams about sitting on her own patient's couch, across a stern looking Dr Gunner with his arms folded over his chest.

"But Danielle," he says, stretching out her name in his particular way that alerts her to an impending scolding. "Is this what you really want? Do you even want a baby, Danielle? Do you, really? Or are you putting yourself in second place again, giving up on what you really want again?"

"I don't know," the Dani in her dream says, squinting her eyes and biting her bottom lip.

"You do know… You just don't want to tell me," says Dr Gunner. "Or in this case; you just don't want to tell yourself."


	3. Chapter 3

When Dani wakes up the next morning, the dream is forgotten. Because Matt's there and then there's languorous morning sex and a joint shower and breakfast, and she feels content when they are driving towards the Hawks' facility together, even more so when Matt grabs her hand on the parking lot and doesn't let go - not even when they are entering the building.

She's glad she's enjoyed it while it lasted, because predictably the universe has a way of making the happiness short-lived. They've barely set a foot inside when Coach hurries up to them, horror on his face, and Dani's bracing herself for what she's sure won't be pleasant news. His words still hit her like a ton of bricks though.

"Nico's been arrested last night," Coach pants, "right here, on the parking lot.

"Oh my God, why?!", Dani yelps - fear, worry, a whole torrent of emotions hitting her system with a shock.

"Christ if I know," Coach sighs, visibly shaken too. "Devin's there now. I'd go too, but there's like a million reporters here and they don't know yet… so."

"We need to keep it that way, yeah," says Matt, glancing at Dani.

"I'll go," Dani says, the words rolling out of her mouth before she has a second to think about it.

"Are you sure?," Matt asks, surprise in his voice.

"Yes," she says, "I'll go. See what I can find out… If there's anything… Maybe he needs…" _Me_, she thinks, but that word she does manage to swallow in time. "Don't worry," she adds, to Matt, because worried is exactly how he looks, "you guys stay here and deal with the press."

"Alright," Matt says, still hesitant, which annoys Dani a little. _How many times has Nico come through for all of them? Why shouldn't she go and help him now? It was hardly the time for petty jealousy._

"My car? Oh… It's here! I left it here last night," she remembers, and she starts rummaging through her bag in search for her car keys.

"Matt! Come on!," Coach's voice booms halfway across the hall and Matt starts to leave, but not before kissing her quickly on the lips. "Call me, as soon as you have news, okay?"

§

"Damn, Nico!", Dani yells to her car windshield, as she's flooring it dangerously fast to the MCC. Her mind reels with potential reasons for his arrest, dismissing murder first, dismissing anything assault-related, though she's very well aware the reality of Nico's job probably had him skirting on the edge of the law on several occasions. Hell, he'd broken into T.K.'s apartment when she'd asked him, didn't he? Her gut, however, tells her this is more fall-out from the Pitmans, has her cursing that family's name. "God, please, he can't have actually hurt someone," she thinks, but it's Nico - all stealth and deep dark secrets, so who really knows. Yet she only has to think about him, the way he was the night he found out Marshal Pitman had died, that soft and vulnerable look on his face when he told her she was the only one who really knew him now, for her to know that that man wouldn't actually do serious damage to another human being, not unless there was a war on and it was his duty to do so. And now that she's allowed the memory to creep back in, she can't quite stop reliving the moment. The taste of him in her mouth and his scent in her nostrils, the way his hands had messed through her hair, that little gleam in his eyes and how his perpetual smirk had for once been absent. "You're not alone," he'd said only a few days before, in that special authoritative way of his that made her believe just about everything he said.

"No," Dani whispers half out loud, narrowly avoiding a red stoplight. "And you're not alone either, Nico Careles."

§

In the hallway of the MCC, Dani spots Devin, the lawyer, who's just finishing up a phone call. He's barely hung up before she pounces on him. "Where is he? What's happened? What are they charging him with? Can I see him?"

"Mrs Santino, please," the lawyer says, holding up his hands as if he needs to defend himself, and then he nudges her towards a quieter corner. "What happened is this: Mrs Pitman has filed a claim against Mr Careles for wrongful interference with Marshal Pitman's inheritance. In other words, she's accusing Nico of helping Juliette cheat her out of a sizable chunk of what she considered to be hers. The Hawks, for starters, but there are other assets involved as well. Mrs Pitman claims she has evidence and will testify against Mr Careles' wrongful intent. From where I'm standing she doesn't have much of a case, if she has any at all, but my guess is this is not about winning a court case, nor is it about money."

"God!," Dani yells, "that woman! Well, can you get him out?"

"Bail hearing's in two hours. There shouldn't be any problem with the judge accepting reasonable bail: Nico's got no priors apart from a juvy citation and he is ex-Navy, which helps too. I've talked to him: he's fine. And he is allowed visitors, you know. I'll go get an officer."

He leaves Dani to pace the hallway by herself, seething at the sheer awfulness of Gabrielle Pitman, trying to wrap her brain around how any woman could do something like this. Hadn't she done enough damage to Juliette? To Nico? Wasn't it enough that Marshal was dead? Her thoughts are interrupted by the return of Devin, followed closely by an officer who barely looks older than Ray Jay.

"If you would follow me, M'am?"

He leads Dani through some narrow corridors unto the holding cells, where she's patted down by a disinterested female officer and then she's ushered into a small visiting room. Inside Nico sits by himself at a table by the window, looking perfectly flawless, perfectly composed. His face, however, Dani notices the minute she sets a foot inside, is pale as a ghost. Dani forces a smile, as she's walking over and then sits down opposite him, nervous all of a sudden. Nico's face is blank when he looks at her, his hazel eyes radiating nothing of the warmth she's grown accustomed to.

"Dr. Santino," he says in greeting. "They sent you?"

Dani shrugs in a failed attempt at lightheartedness. "The place is a media circus, what with the game and Rex's revelation yesterday. The press doesn't know you've been arrested and Coach and Matt wanted to stay there to contain it if necessary. So I offered… Oh Nico, I'm so sorry!" She lunges to take hold of his hands, but he pulls away, averting his eyes.

"It's nothing," he says, his tone flat, mechanical. "Gabrielle's got no proof. Nothing that will stick anyway. She can drag my name through the mud a little, but nothing that's happened between us is particularly shocking or scandalous. So what if one of the aids slept with the bosses' wife like what… 5 times over the course of twenty plus years? Juliette isn't even mine, even though Gabrielle went out of her way to make me think so all these years. She just wants… revenge. On me, for not choosing her. On Juliette, because Marshall loved her more than he loved Gabrielle. On Marshall, for dying on her, poor bastard."

"Oh God. Tell me what I can do? I could call Juliette…"

"No. You do nothing!" Nico practically barks at her, and Dani's shocked at the sudden anger. She can't recall ever seeing Nico angry before. She's seen him break up fights, but then he just looked stern, and she's seen him upset, but then he just looked worried or vaguely sad. This, him being angry at her, the cold and hard look in his eyes, makes her stomach sink into her shoes. And he's not done either. "I mean it, Dr Santino, I don't need you to do anything. Don't call Juliette. I'll be out in a few hours and on my way to Dallas. Go back to the facility. Go back to Matt." He near-spits that last word at her. It's lucky the table's in between them, Dani thinks, because Nico has a look on his face that sends a shiver up her spine, but she knows he could never really hurt her, not really, and that the truth is that she's hurt him. The realization hits Dani with a certainty that has her stomach churning. He'd kissed her. Practically told her straight out she was the reason he would stay or go. And she'd ignored it. She'd let his subdued, introvert manner lead her into believing that whatever feelings he had for her, to him it was still a game, nothing serious. Or maybe she'd just been so caught up in herself, in her own confused emotional state that she'd lacked proper consideration for his. And… Oh God! He must have seen the kiss she shared with Matt, at the game, she thinks, and she hates herself a little then, for being so damn selfish and insensitive to rub his face into it like that. Still, she's Danielle Santino. She doesn't give up without a fight.

"No", she says, her voice rising in a shrill pitch. "You never let me down, Nico. I'll be damned if I let you down now. You've had our backs like a million times. For once… uggh!… just let someone return the favor, will you?"

Nico falls quiet after that, but Dani can see tiny lines in his face that are breaking, softening into something more familiar.

"Dani," he finally sighs. "I… eh… appreciate what you're trying to do, but I don't think there's much you actually can do. If Gabrielle's out to make my life miserable, it could become an ugly fight. You don't want to get caught in the middle of this. I don't want you to get caught in the middle of this." There's a slight smile around his mouth now, and something quite telling there at the edge of it, which makes Dani's heart a sudden butterfly in her chest. She's seconds away from giving in to the impulse of running her fingers over his one day's stubble and through his hair, they way she had that night on her porch, but again they are saved by the bell - in this case the young officer who enters the room to tell them that their time's up. Dani gets up, and then gives in to the desire to touch anyway, leaning close to press a kiss to his hairline: a lingering thing, longing, breathing him in. "I'll be here when you make bail," she says, and then she's out the door without looking back even once.


	4. Chapter 4

Dani goes back to the waiting room. She makes use of the time to call the kids, who are on their way home, and to call Matt to fill him in on the details of what Nico and Devin have told her. Matt sounds jittery on the phone, explaining how the place is literally swarming with press.

"They all want to talk to Rex, so we've set up an interview room. So far, Rex is holding up his spirits, and T.K.'s there too. Put at least one reporter in his place for being an ass and asking impertinent questions. Our boy comes through when he wants to."

"Yes, he does," Dani says with a smile in her voice, feeling immensely proud of both quarterback and wide receiver.

"Look, Dani, I really can't talk much now. Call me after Nico's hearing, will you? Bring Nico back here - my guess is Coach is going to wanna talk to him."

'"I'm not sure he'll come, Matt. He's pretty insistent on leaving for Dallas as soon as he gets out. But I'll call you."

"Alright. Bye."

After that, Dani's got nothing to do but wait, but just when she's about to get bored and anxious, Xeno walks into the waiting room, sits down next to her and hands her a Cosmopolitan magazine.

"What?," Dani quips at the scary looking bodyguard. "No pancakes?"

Xeno gives her a look, grunts, and then goes through his coat pocket in search of something. His face breaks into a wide grin as he seems to find it, and he hands Dani a sweet, which has her laughing so hard her cheeks hurt.

§

Two hours later Devin comes to collect them to go to court. Dani's nervous, wilting in the heat of the courtroom, her feet screaming in her high heels. As soon as they lead Nico in, she forgets her discomfort. He flashes her a look in passing; his dark, brooding eyes bring back the butterfly in her chest and in the back of her mind she's saying, "Get a grip, Santino. He's not on his way to death row - yet." But all through the hearing - when the judge reads the charges, and Devin pleads not guilty and then when bail is set - she doesn't take her eyes off Nico's back for one second, watching him as he sits almost immobile, head tilted slightly to the side. And then it's over, and they're all outside on the court steps. Devin says his goodbyes after a brief private conference with Nico, after which Nico whispers a few words to Xeno, who takes of too - not before waving goodbye at her - and so they're alone.

Nico's standing next to her with his hands in the pockets of his trousers, looking like he's got a million things to say but can't locate his voice to say them. The silence stretches on too long, stretches and stretches until the traffic noise and the chatter of people passing them by starts to fill in the spaces, and Dani tries to think of something to say and discards all of it, feeling suddenly very tired like a child at the end of a day, too tongue-tied to say what she wants or even know it.

It's Nico who capitulates first. "My car is still at the Hawks' facility. I need a ride, but…"

"But?"

"I was wondering if you'd like to go get a coffee first. I could use an espresso or two. Maybe three or four even."

§

They go to a tiny Italian coffee bar that Nico knows is in walking distance of the court house and Dani's surprised and appalled at the same time that she didn't know of its existence. It's about as Italian as it gets - crowded, loud, real Venetian blends - and not much to look at in the way of decor, more like a hole in the wall with wobbly tables and chairs, but they find themselves a spot by the window and when Antonio - who seems well acquainted with Nico, judging by the way he kisses him cheerily on both cheeks - comes to take their order, the real reason for Nico bringing her there is revealed.

"Try the cannoli," Nico says, smiling. "You won't be disappointed."

"Ay!," Antonio shouts, recognizing a fellow Italian-American when he sees one. "Es molto bene!"

"If they turn out to be better than mine, I'm gonna eat my foot," Dani bristles, and Nico chuckles and then laughs, eyes crinkling, emitting a deep husky sound that curls around her. It's only minutes later when her eyes go wide, as the delicious taste of Antonio's homemade cannoli explodes into her mouth and has her moaning.

"Should I untie your shoe for you?," Nico teases, but Dani's way too busy devouring the luscious dessert to even pay attention to him now or flash him one of her dirty looks.

Nico's watching her then with something like… a lot of _like_, and after a while it makes Dani uncomfortable. "I'm sorry I got angry before," he finally says, grave, scrubbing his hands over his face. His voice sounds raspy from exhaustion, and he's still pale.

Dani's thinking of ways to make light of the awkwardness of the moment, but nothing feels light - not Gabrielle dragging Nico into court out of spite, not the fact that he's leaving. Her happy morning with Matt feels like a million years ago all of a sudden. "Please, don't apologize. I'm sorry. I wish there was something…"

"There's nothing you can do, Dani," Nico interrupts her.

"I know," she says, quietly. "That just makes me feel so powerless."

Nico nods, a sad smile hovering over his face. "You're very dedicated, Dani," he says, and before Dani can tense up about it, he murmurs, "The Hawks are very lucky to have you on the job."

Their eyes meet, and Dani dares herself not to look away and then finds that she can't, because an unsettling edge creeps into Nico's eyes. It's the type of look Nico specializes in: invasive, intense - as though he sees right through her, sees things she's barely even aware of herself. They're close enough for Dani to catch the subtle drift of his cologne, which brings back memories of their kiss. She can tell Nico's right there too, from the way his eyes dart to her mouth, and her heart hammers in her throat as she watches his pupils dilate.

"So why _did_ you kiss me?," he asks softly, barely more than a whisper.

This time, he's not letting her off the hook easy by answering for her, she knows. This time he actually expects an answer. _Because I wanted it too,_ she thinks. _Because I needed to. Because, in that moment, it felt so strange that I never considered it before. Or maybe I had, but not… not really. Not consciously. _All that, Dani thinks, but none of it will come out, none of it synthesizes into a coherent thought she can voice, as she feels herself go red, a blush going wild over her cheeks, starting down the hollow of her neck. She's just about to just wing it, say anything, when she's interrupted by her mobile ringing.

It's Matt. Dani answers, on automatic pilot, but she can't peel her eyes away from Nico's, sees the shadow settling on his face once he registers who she's talking to. Matt is telling her about more interviews, and she's 'uh-uh-ing', not really listening, until he tells her he got a text from Noelle. "She wants to talk to me," Matt says, "and, well… I guess I should do the right thing and officially break things off with her rather than having her hear it through the grapevine, so, would you mind terribly if I agreed?" Dani supposes she should feel at least a hint of jealousy, but she doesn't. Instead she tells him she's fine with him meeting up with Noelle, meaning it, and then tells him she has to run, that she'll talk to him later, before she hangs up the phone.

"So," Nico says, face blank and unreadable again. "You and Matt…"

Dani feels embarrassed enough to avert her eyes, not even sure why, nods.

"I understand," Nico says, and Dani thinks that might be the very first lie he ever told her. "Well, I guess that answers that question. So, how about a lift to the facility?"

Nico gets up before Dani gets a chance to say anything else, leaving her nothing to do but follow him out of the coffee bar, wondering why on earth she feels so abjectly miserable about everything that her feet feel like lead in her shoes.


	5. Chapter 5

When they arrive at the facility, most of the press corps has gone and Coach has them ushered into his office right away.

"Are you alright?," he asks Nico.

"I'm fine," Nico answers, his usual stoic self again. "Didn't get much sleep last night, but I'll live. And before you ask: don't worry about the charge. It's a hoax. Devin says it probably won't even make it to trial."

"Yes, well, I'm afraid a possible trial is not the only thing we have to worry about," Coach says.

"What are you talking about?"

"I just got off the phone with Mark Cuban. He said to tell you that, although the deal with the Hawks is still on, he's withdrawing the offer he made you, since, and I quote, _this legal hassle with the Pitmans is bad for business_."

"Oh my God," Dany moans, face going colorless with shock and her eyes round like dinner plates.

Nico storms away with his mobile pressed to his ear before Dani has time to blink, and she looks wearily at Coach. "You know, it could be just me getting paranoid, but I doubt we've seen the end of our troubles with the Pitmans."

"You don't have to tell me, Dr Santino" Coach groans. 'I'm pretty sure my ulcer's just woken up again."

Dani leaves Coach's office in search of Nico, but he's nowhere to be seen, and Dani guesses she can understand that. What she can't understand is the text Lindsay then sends her, which has her hurling through traffic again, for the second time that day.

"Ray Jay is leaving… Tonight!"

"He packed his bags, mom, he's leaving tonight," Lindsay says as she's coming down the stairs, just when Dani sets a foot inside the door. The bag that sits on the hallway carpet predicts nothing good.

"Ray Jay, what's going on?," Dani says, playing it as calm as she can muster.

"I've made my decision and I'm going."

"No. You can't just take off."

"Mom. Juliette has a private jet. She wants to get out of town tonight. I don't have a choice."

"Yes, you do," Dani says, pleading. "Honey, I've been where you are. Head over heels, heat of the moment. But you can not just throw away your life in a snap second because of a girl. Okay? So, just put that down, let's take a beat, we'll talk."

"There's nothing to talk about. Dad already tried. I made up my mind, I'm going."

"Ray Jay, I love you, you know I love you. But I don't support this. I _can not _support this, you are making a huge mistake."

"It's my mistake to make," Ray Jay says, and Dani needs to fight back tears and fight back the urge to grab Ray Jay's ear, the way she used to do when he was five, and drag him up to his room, have him stay there until he comes to his senses.

Yet all she can do is withdraw when Ray Jay kisses her and tells her he loves her, playing one last card that she knows won't make any difference. "If you walk out that door, you're on your own."

"I know," Ray Jay says, and it shocks Dani to see that the little boy Ray Jay once was is gone. It's a grown man, albeit a very stupid one, giving her one last solemn look and then walking out the door. Lindsay storms of towards her bedroom, leaving Dani standing alone in the hallway. It feels like someone's pressing against a bruise over thin skin: a deep, rounded ache that flowers open in her chest. She just stands there, crying quietly in the hallway of the home she can't seem to keep together, until her face is a disaster zone of tears and running eye makeup.

In the middle of the night, Dani wakes up to loud knocks on the doorframe that send her heart rate skyrocketing. For once, she prays it's Nico. That he's somehow managed to swoop Juliette's jet out of mid air, made Ray Jay and Juliette see the error of their ways and have them come home. When she does open the door, it's to Matt, looking queasy and serious. Dani wonders just how much worse a day can possibly get.

She lets Matt maneuver her into her office, sitting her down on the couch, and Dani's so tired she's hallucinating.

Matt won't look at her. He touches his forehead, slides one hand into his trouser pocket. "Noelle…," he stammers, "I… She…"

Dani feels a creep of sickening, knowing suspicion roiling her stomach, but she waits for Matt to get it together enough to say it.

"She's pregnant, Dani. Noelle…"

Dani blinks. She should be feeling pain right now. Crippling hurt even. But instead it's just a cold numbness that takes root in the base of her spine. She's probably cried all her tears before. "I see," she says, voice level. "Is it yours?"

"Yes," Matt whispers. "She swore. And I believe her. Dani, I don't know what to do…"

Dani takes a deep breath. "You do know what to do," she says, echoing Dr Gunner, "you just don't want to tell me."

This moment, this room, Matt staring at the floor between them, it feels surreal now, like it's happening to someone else, like Dani's watching herself from a distance. Dani knows all too well that the sensation is basically a defense mechanism to being stuck in an emotional roller-coaster.

"She wants to keep it. And I can't… I can't _not_ be a father to this baby, Dani. A _real_ father. Not one who visits every once in a while."

Dani stares at the wall. This is her room, she thinks, where she helps people uncover what's hiding in their unconscious, where she comforts and holds the hands of grieving men and women. The room looks and feels exactly the same now that she's the one grieving, although what it is exactly she's grieving for the most, she can't say. In 24 hours she's gone from hoping that happily ever after was within the realm of possibilities to a place where everything has disintegrated. Where Ray Jay is gone, and Matt as good as, and Nico… Somehow her heart aches at the thought of Nico and she finds herself wishing he was there, taking care of anything that upsets her the way he used to. Her mind is a muddled mess in which nothing is very clear except one predominant desire: to have Matt leave, now. Suddenly her floor looks very enticing again, but she reminds herself it's not over yet, that she can't fall over into the deep end. Even with Ray Jay and Matt and Nico gone, Lindsay and T.K. still need her, the team still needs her. It's a funny thing to realize at the bottom of yourself, when you're entirely spent, that there's something hidden away for emergencies.

Dani exhales, all the air whooshing out of her. "Maybe this is the universe telling us something, Matt," she says. "You got what you wished for. Just not… Just with a different woman. Maybe… Surely, it's for the best. Because I lied when I said I wanted to have your baby. I never have and I never will."

The last color on Matt's face goes away, and Dani knows it's brutal, but somehow it feels important - burning every possible bridge, every possible way back. Dani gets up and moves to the door. She stares at a point somewhere above Matt's head, who's still gaping at her with his mouth hanging open. "It will take some time, Matt, before we'll go back to anything resembling normal. We'll get there eventually, I hope. But now, I would very much like you to leave." Matt gets up too, looking lost. At the door he leans into her, just briefly, sounding choked when he says, "I'm so sorry, Dani. About everything."

"Me too," Dani whispers, as she closes the door forever on the man she thought she was going to grow old with.

§

Nico does his own disintegrating, by himself in his loft that very same moment. He's been drinking all evening, something he never does, after the phone call with Mark Cuban made it clear that Cuban wasn't going to reconsider. From the way Cuban flustered and tutted, Nico is pretty sure Gabrielle somehow managed to get her hooks into Cuban and is calling the shots behind the scenes. Very well, then. So he stays with the Hawks for the time being.

Dani again weighs heavily on his mind, having him almost sick with worry. First there was a text from Juliette, informing him _they_ were on their way to Paris. '_They_' could only mean Ray Jay had indeed _not_ come to his senses. Nico can only imagine the despair it must have thrown Dani in. He wants to tell her, but he won't, not yet, that she shouldn't worry - already he's put someone in play in Paris, to watch over them so they don't get into too much trouble.

Just a minute ago, one of his little birds informed him Donnally had just left Dani's house - tires screeching and everything. That same little bird had told him Donnally had met Noelle Saris earlier, and from the way she was eyeing Donnally at the press conference and the fact that Donnally and Dani's relationship had apparently ended again, not a day after their reunion, Nico can make an educated guess. The reporter's pregnant. And Donnally's a total idiot.

Nico contemplates going over to Dani's house, but it's getting close to morning and by now she's hopefully asleep. He thinks about how lost she must be feeling, wonders if she's spread herself out again on the carpet in her office, like a drowning angel. How everything managed to turn itself inside out in the course of one day, he'll never grasp. Still, the desire to go over to Dani's house is so palpable he can taste it. Instead, he pours himself yet another whiskey, trying to drown his own ragged emotions in more alcoholic stupor. With the state they're both in, it doesn't take rocket science to figure out where they'll end up, and while the thought of emotionally fraught, desperate comfort sex isn't completely unappealing to Nico, he also knows it's a bad idea. A _very_ bad idea. Things have changed between him and Dr Santino. He can't just show up anymore, whenever he thinks she might need him. This time, it really is her move or nothing.


	6. Chapter 6

In the midst of chaos, stars are born.

As soon as the holidays start, Dani packs her bags, Lindsay and herself of to Spain, where they arrive just in time to witness the birth of Analia, a healthy baby girl who weighs just over 7 pounds and looks the spitting image of her mother. Jeanette and Augusto are exhausted as much as overjoyed and overwhelmed, but they still find time to make Dani and Lindsay feel at home.

Dani instantly likes Barcelona, its busy street life, its lively inhabitants. She visits some of the main tourist attractions with Lindsay, but most of the time she stays home with Jeanette and the baby. Lindsay's out befriending all the kids in the neighborhood and pretty soon becomes thick as thieves with a young Spanish boy named Fernando. One night Dani sees them kissing on the porch and she tells her daughter, "I you elope too, I will kill you!", but she's smiling, happy that Lindsay is having a good time and stopped being angry at her for Ray Jay leaving.

"Gah, mom, it's just a summer romance, nothing to worry about," Lindsay quips in a mock teenage huff, before kissing her mother goodnight and going to bed.

In between outings and baby care Jeanette forces Dani to tell her everything - everything, Santino! - that's happened. And so Dani talks. About Matt and getting back together. About her promise to have his baby and it still not feeling right. She tells Jeanette this while Analia is stretched out blissfully on her lap, indulging in sleeping beautifully the way only babies can. "I mean, I look at her, and she's gorgeous, Jeanette. She's gorgeous and lovely. But I don't want a baby anymore. Or at least I didn't want a baby with Matt."

"So does that mean you're not upset he's starting a family with Noelle now?"

"I'm not sure," Dani answers truthfully. "It feels like I should be heartbroken about it, but I'm not. I'm sad, about the way everything turned out, yes. I feel empty. That's shock, of course. But the strange thing is: since I've been here, I've barely thought of Matt at all. I don't know what that means."

"Maybe that means he really just was your rebound guy after all. You wanted to be in love with him more than you actually were..", Jeanette says, handing her a glass of red after putting Analia in a nearby crib.

Dani needs several more glasses to broach the subject of Nico and even then she can barely make sense of it to Jeanette. She remembers the conversation they had in the Hawks' hallway all of a sudden, after the kiss and her avoiding him for weeks. "Should we talk?," he'd asked, sensing her confusion, her inner turmoil, raising his eyebrow the way he did. "No," she'd said. "Not until I figure out what is is I want to say." Months later she still doesn't know what she wants to say. Right now she only knows that not being friends with him anymore the way they used to be, jars. And that she does think of him. That she misses their easy banter. Though what she really misses is a significant other in her life, someone she can buy Christmas presents for and kiss good morning, someone who listens to _her_ for a change, as a counterweight to her always listening to everyone else. The truth is that she has no idea if Nico does any of these things, or if they're all far too common for him. If, once he gets over the novelty of her, _she_ won't be too common for him.

T.K. calls about a dozen times while Dani's in Barcelona. He never says in so many words, but Dani knows T.K. misses her, that, even though he's doing much better after his rehab, part of him clings to her out of fear that he might relapse. "So Dr D," T.K. says over the phone, "have you heard? Matt has now moved in with this reporter. Half the team wants to kill him for dumping you over that chick."

Dani sighs. "T.K. please! Just tell everyone to calm down, okay? I'm fine. We're fine. In the end it just wasn't meant to be, I guess."

"Wow, Dr D, you're being a bigger, eh, man about it than I would be. So you been gettin' it on with some cute Spanish dude or what? Bit of revenge sex?"

"Jeezes, T.K., I'm here with my friend, who's just had a baby, and my daughter's here too. I'm not gonna go about dating some random guys!"

"Come on, Dr D. You're way too feisty and too young to be sitting on the fence. Oh, and by the way, guess who's asked about you?"

"Who?"

"Nico!"

"Oh… He's still there then?"

"Sure, he's still here, where else would he be?"

"Alright."

"So? You don't want to know?"

"Fine, T.K., tell me."

"Well, he was in my car after practice, all stealth and shit, Nico-style, you know? And I'm thinking, damn, something bad's up, but he just asked if I'd been in touch with you. And then he wanted to know how you were, you know."

"Oh. And what did you say?"

"Not much. That we talked on the phone and that you're fine, enjoying the sun and Spain and all that. You know, Dr D?"

"What?"

"I think Nico _likes_ you."

"…"

"Cat got your tongue, Dr D? It's not like you to be lost for words. Could it be? Are you?" T.K. bursts out laughing. "You _like_ him too?! Oh, that is good. _Hahaha_. That's just ace! Dr D and Nico, sitting in a tree, K I S S.."

"T.K. I swear to God, I am hanging up on you NOW!"

"Alright, Dr D, talk to you soon! Byeee! "

§

A week before they're scheduled to fly home, Dani sits on the porch of Gusto's and Jeanette's house one morning when she receives a phone call from none other than Juliette Pittman.

"Dr Santino?", Juliette says, a tremor in her voice. "Please, this is silly. Talk to Ray Jay."

Dani can hear the phone being passed over and then hears her son's voice, after a month of non-communication.

"Mom," Ray Jay says, sounding muffled like he's about to cry. "Mom, please don't put the phone down. I wanted to talk to you. I've been meaning to call so many times before, but then I though you might still be angry and I didn't."

"How are you, Ray Jay? Is everything alright?"

"Paris, mom! It's amazing! The bureau's amazing too. Fantastique! See, I already speak some French. I'm learning so much, mom. Please, don't be mad at me anymore."

Dani sighs. "I'm just worried, Ray Jay. What about college? What about your education?"

"I'll do it, mom, I promise. Next year. But this is the best work experience I could hope for. Please, mom, you have to believe me. Why don't you? Maybe you should come and see for yourself?"

It takes some extra pleading from both Juliette and Lindsay, but in the end Dani agrees to switch plane tickets and leave Barcelona a day early for Paris and afterwards she's glad for it. The fashion bureau Juliette has set up is booming, and the once so fickle, addiction-prone girl seems to finally have found her calling. Juliette looks better and less thin when she collects Lindsay and Dani from the Charles de Gaulle airport, explaining how they're in the midst of preparing their first fashion show so Ray Jay needed to stay at the bureau, and Ray Jay… Dani's mouth practically falls open when she sees her son running about like he owns the place, giving directions to designers, models and assistants like he's done it all his life and half in French to boot.

Then Ray Jay sees them and there's hugging and some tears and some whispered apologies, and by the time Juliette has taken them all out to dinner that evening and they're strolling along the Seine afterwards, Dani thinks she may be able to reconcile herself with this sabbatical her son decided to take. There's a moment, when out of the corner of her eye Dani thinks she sees Nico standing on one of the bridges nearby, looking in their direction, but when she turns to take a better look, he's gone, leaving Dani to wonder is she's now becoming so obsessed with him that she starts seeing him even when he's not there.

§

"So, the holiday was nice and Paris was nice too, and Ray Jay's doing fine," Dr Gunner says on their first meeting after Dani's return from Europe. "The real question is: how are you feeling, Danielle?"

"Fine," Dani says, not folding her arms over her chest.

"Yeah?," Dr Gunner lifts an eyebrow at her.

"Weird, I know, after everything that's happened. But I feel better, about the whole Ray Jay thing, now that I've seen him, now that I'm sure Juliette's not just dragging him from one drug party to the next."

"And Matt?"

"Matt is… Matt."

"Danielle…"

"Aargh, what do you want me to say? I doubt he's happy. But he'll be a dad soon enough and that _will_ make him happy."

"But how about you? Are you happy?"

Dani shrugs. "It's just me and Linds in the house now. Things are very quiet. So much so that I can't actually wait for the season to start again. Maybe I'm just feeling a little…"

"Go on."

"I don't know, lonely? T.K. and Linds are wonderful, but they're just kids. I miss Jeanette. Matt too, in a way, I guess. I miss adult conversation."

"What happened to your other friend? Your colleague, the one of the dalliance, what's his name… Nico?"

This time, Dani does cross her arms instinctively over her chest, eyes fixed on a spot somewhere above Dr Gunner's head.

"That bad, huh?"

"Not _bad_. You know, he stayed in New York. The trial went away without so much as a splash, though I'm sure Gabrielle Pittman has more surprises up her sleeve. He… I don't think he likes that she thwarted his plans to go to Dallas, but I've barely seen him, let alone talked to him about that."

"And that irks you?"

"It's just different now. All those things he used to do… Texting me, or showing up in the middle of the night. Sneaking up on me. That used to irritate me, but I guess I kinda liked it too, this _understanding_, this _friendship_ that we had."

"And now you miss it?"

Dani doesn't know what to say, and the worst part is feeling her tears well up and over, and something that sticks like broken glass in her throat.

"Right," Dr Gunner says, handing her a box of tissues. "How about I make some dinner and we watch a few episodes of Downton Abbey together?"


	7. Chapter 7

_Author's note: This is a (very) short Nico POV that just popped up out of nowhere. Style-wise, it doesn't really fit with the previous or the next chapter, which is why I'm posting it separately. It does, however, show that Nico's becoming a little obsessed with Dani (and I like the idea that he's been having these kinds of thoughts about her all along, carefully hidden behind that stoic, sardonic facade ;-) ) Bear with me a little longer and we'll be moving onto fluffier and smuttier things…_

Nico knows he has been staring at her for the entire meeting. Not just staring - absorbing, and with no amount of furtiveness. Dani must have noticed - he doesn't much mind that idea anymore. It is impossible for him to tear his eyes away. The harsh lights of the meeting room never strikes her viciously, only ever serving to cause her hair to glint different shades of autumn colors. Today is no exception, a glow of reds warming her features. She is stunning (always always always), but even more so today. He thinks it is because he has let her invade his thoughts so completely that he is seeing her so definitively now. He is hypnotised by the wisp of hair that she tucks so delicately behind her ear, by her eyes as they focus on the whoever is speaking (he has stopped listening long ago), by her tongue as it skims across her lips unconsciously (he can't imagine how he'd ever think again if she started doing it intentionally). An awareness flutters into his mind, spreading its wings to brush conscious thought - it has been some time since he has kissed her. The thought beats its wings, refusing to be ignored. The meeting ends. She has already grabbed her notepad and is now leaning against the table, smiling, talking about some of the points raised but really just spinning out the words to extend their time. He can see her doing it. He is aware of his heartbeat (beating passion and love and fire) as he stands and rounds the table. She is relaxed, her face soft and graced with a smile. Her mouth (he is trying and failing not to stare) is still framing words about the meeting. He should be listening - he is, he isn't, he simply cannot hear her over the wing-beats), he loves how her mind works, how fast it is, how she knows how to get what she wants. He loves her mouth, that gate between her thoughts and her voice. He feels his own mouth turn up into a smile. He wants to kiss her again. It seems ridiculous that he is not. He cannot think of a reason why he shouldn't be. (He can list off excuses: they're in public, they are professionals, she is, still, ambivalent.) Ridiculous. He wants to kiss her, _now_.


	8. Chapter 8

_Author's note: Sorry this update took a little longer, pretty busy with work right now! _

Once the season kicks up to speed, Dani soon finds the trouble with Rex's coming out has far from ended. The press has eased off and the whole team takes it in brotherly stride, following T.K.'s example, but as it turns out, other teams are less lenient.

A game against the Pittsburgh Vikings practically ends up in a brawl on the field, and afterwards Coach drags Dani's ass, and Matt's and Nico's into the locker room, where he grills the team long and hard enough to get them to spill what's going on.

Dani immediately notes that Rex is nowhere to be seen, and one look at Nico's weary face is enough to confirm her suspicions.

It's T.K. who speaks up first. "They're killing him, Coach! Rex, I mean. You know… There's always nasty things being said on the field. We all know it, it's part of the game. But ever since the season started, it's like they're all targeting Rex. Calling him a nancy boy and a faggot like constantly, you know, it's been getting to him… And today this bitch ass…

"T.K.!," Coach booms at him.

"Alright, alright. Today this lovely human being the Vikings call their wide receiver just went at him all game. That Rex was a pervert, and he was bringing shame to the game, and that he sure as hell would never leave his little brother in Rex's neighborhood, cause it starts with gay and then…" T.K. sighs. "Coach, really, it was nasty. Rex is gonna quit, if this keeps up."

"Alright, everyone," Nico says, "we understand. But there's not much we can do about this. You guys are just going to have to tough this one out. Dr Dani - he nods at her - will talk to Rex. As for the rest of you, just don't allow them to provoke you. This is just one of those times where the less you do, the better it is. Eventually it will become old news and eventually it will pass."

Dani looks around at the players, taking the temperature of the room. She doesn't like what she sees. Anger, defiance - Nico may be right, but they're football players, and thus exactly the opposite of the type of guys who walk away when one of their own is being harangued. She can tell Nico knows too, from the way he looks worried. There's never a situation Nico can't fix, except maybe this time. It rattles him, she can tell. Dani can also tell he looks tired, though he hides it well under his flawless hair and his flawless suit and his flawless everything. Dani wants to go over and talk to him, maybe try and lighten his mood a little bit, but Matt and Coach are calling her over and so she just watches Nico out of the corner of her eye as he's following the players leaving the room.

§

Hours later, Dani is jolted awake by the harsh ringing of her phone and answers to an out of breath-sounding, speed-talking Nico.

"Dani? Dani. I'm sorry I woke you, but you need to listen to me and do as I say, _right now_. There's been a fight at the club between some players of the Pittsburgh Vikings and our lot and it's bad. We tried to intervene and… Dani, Xeno got stabbed. I don't know how bad it is, yet, so I need you to come here, now, the police are here too, and I got to get to the hospital, but I need to know someone will talk to the players, make sure none of them get it into their heads to do anything rash, and please, please, will you come?"

Dani's already jumped out of bed and half dressed by the time she gets a word in, telling Nico she's on her way and that he has to hang up the phone and get his ass over to the hospital, like pronto. She's speeding all the way to the club, which looks like a war-zone with all the squad cars outside, and death-stares the officer at the entrance until he lets her enter. Most of the players are still there, surrounded by cops, and so are T.K. and Rex, both white as a sheet.

The officer running the scene turns out to be the understanding sort.

"Oh, so you're the Hawks' shrink? That guy, the scary looking one in black who's friends with the dude that got stabbed, he told us you were coming," he says, while he keeps writing stuff down in his notebook.

"What happened?," Dani wants to know.

"According to several witnesses, a whole posse of Vikings came into the club looking for Mr Rex Evans over there. Apparently they ganged up on him when he was getting drinks, started pushing him around. This guy who got stabbed, Xeno? Him and the man in black, they tried to get Evans out of there, but then this one Viking head-butted this Xeno character and all hell broke lose from there. Somewhere in the brawl, some idiot drew a knife. We've arrested that one, of course, along with the rest of the Vikings. I think we may have arrived just in time, it could have been a lot worse."

"Can I talk to my players?"

"Yes, M'am, you can, we're almost sending them all home anyway."

Rex is practically in tears when Dani moves over to talk to the players that are still there.

"How is he, Dr Santino? Do you have news?"

"I don't know anything more than you do, guys. Nico called me right before he rushed to the hospital, and I'll be going there next, okay?"

"Oh God, I hope he's alright," Rex moans. "I can't believe this is happening…"

"Look, why don't you all go home? T.K., you can drive Rex. I'll text all of you as soon as I have an update, but right now I think it's more important that you all go home, get a good night's rest, give your girlfriends and your boyfriend a hug and we'll talk about this tomorrow at the facility, alright?"

§

It's nearly five in the morning when Dani finally arrives at the emergency wing of the hospital. The night-nurse at the desk informs her Xeno's had surgery, and that it went well, and that he's sleeping in the recovery ward. "His friend is still here though," she nods towards the waiting room, before she hurries over to the door where an ambulance has just pulled up. Dani does find Nico, sitting upright but fast asleep on a chair in said waiting room, his head tilted slightly backwards against the wall. Dani sits next to him, unsure what to do. Then she decides: she is giving the guy an extra five minutes of sleep. The dark circles under Nico's eyes speak of exhaustion and he looks scary thin and small all of a sudden. Dani worries about the way his muscles seem to drain out of him. And yet, at the same time he is beautiful. This man in black with deep dark secrets in his soft eyes and his ridiculous garden of good hair. Feeling kinda weary herself, Dani wishes she could just snuggle up to him, fold her arms across Nico's chest, rest her head in the crook of his neck and close her eyes too. She swallows, blood rushing to her head, when at last all of her denial crumbles away. There is no mistaking the flutter around her heart anymore, the adrenaline rushing through her stomach. 'I think I'm in love with you', Dani whispers to Nico's sleeping form. It's barely audible, but mouthing the words shocks her to bits nonetheless. She stops thinking. Reaches over and ever so gently touches his face, soft skin underneath the tops of her fingers. She then brushes a tiny lock of rich black hair from his forehead. At this Nico opens his eyes and looks straight at her. Too quickly. Too clear. Too intense. He'd been awake the whole time, Dani thinks in a panic. Her right hand is trailing on his cheek and Nico takes her wrist, to make her keep it there, while he slowly caresses the soft skin on the inside of her wrist with his thumb. He makes no other move, just locks his eyes into hers. Dani imagines hers look like those of a deer caught in headlights, but his are nothing other than the most intense fire she has ever seen. Like he is trying to burn holes in all her defenses using only his eyes. They are eight different colors of brown and green, and something something behind them that refuses to bend. She leans towards him ever so slightly and sees her fingers come to life on their own - as if someone has taken over the remote control in her brain. She touches his ear. Brushes through his hair - it feels bristly, but soft. It feels exactly the way she remembers. Dani's eyes drop to Nico's mouth, and her fingers follow, coming to rest against his bottom lip. He grabs them. Holds them there, before - in slow motion it seems - he pushes on her index finger, sucks it into his mouth. Dani feels warm wetness and then his tongue, sliding against it. Simple, yet so unbelievably erotic. A small moan escapes her throat, as Nico puts his teeth against the top of her finger, starts licking and nibbling it softly. Dani is mesmerized by the power of the sensations he creates - it literally feels as if all her erogenous zones are getting the exact same treatment. All sound fades into the background, apart from their shallow, ragged breathing. Dani lets her finger pop out of his mouth, slides it across his bottom lip, very, very slowly moisturizing it. Then everything happens at the same time: Dani swallows hard, Nico lunges himself towards her and Coach comes crashing into the waiting room.


	9. Chapter 9

_**Author's note: The first chapter for which the M rating is actually necessary ;-) Please skip over this one and move on to the next if this kind of thing offends you!**_

Nico slams the door of his loft shut, locks it, and leaning against it, tries to regain control. He feels raw. Muttering swear words under his breath, he keeps repeating in his head, "it's okay, you just got interrupted," but he knows it isn't just that. He gets the curious sensation that things are spinning out of his control, fast - first with the fight at the club, then Xeno getting stabbed, then Dani. It's completely unlike him to get this upset, but he is exhausted. Not just physically - he is also getting exhausted with suppressing all those pretty intense emotions he is having about Dani. She really unhinged him just then. If Coach hadn't walked in and if he'd had his way, he would have been capable of fucking her right there in the waiting room, damn the consequences and damn the lack of professionalism. He throws one book across the room, then another. Doesn't help. He drops himself on the sofa, resting his elbows on his knees, his face in his hands, trying to concentrate on his breathing. He closes his eyes for a second and in an instant, Dani is there. She is there again, sitting next to him, with her fucking finger in his mouth and her hair falling down and her leg rubbing against his and her breasts in that shirt. He could have sworn he saw her nipples get hard when he was nibbling her finger. He is getting hard himself now, and he isn't exactly proud of himself, but not exactly beating himself up either, when he decides to do the one thing that probably will calm him. He leans back, unzips. His cock jumps as soon as he circles it with his hand. He moves fast and a little rough, twisting a little over the head with each rapid flick of his wrist, too well practiced. He has no intention of making this last longer than absolutely necessary. He closes his eyes so fantasy can take over. In his head he pulls her on top of him, gets rid of her T-shirt and her bra in just a few swift movements. He will love her breasts, he is sure. Dani's hardly coy about showing some cleavage, to the point where it tends to rattle him and he has seen her nipples peeking through her shirt on occasion, wants to lick, thumb and suck them all at the same time. He imagines sliding his hand over the soft skin of her stomach, all the way down to the elastic waistband of her panties. He slips his hand in, plays with soft curly pubes until she begs him, begs him to do more. The idea of putting one, then two fingers inside her is so powerful to Nico, he can almost feel and smell her for real, as he grits his teeth and then blows, seeing nothing but her eyes in the blur that ensues.


	10. Chapter 10

Somehow Dani manages to scrape through the following week in one piece, even though the memory of what happened in the waiting room at the hospital haunts her almost continually. She told Nico she was _in love_ with him. Or thought she was. And they'd almost kissed. Again. If Coach hadn't burst in when he did - demanding to know why the hell he was being dragged out of bed in the middle of the night, and if Nico was maybe losing his touch, allowing things to escalate into that kind of violence - and if Dani hadn't grabbed that opportunity to get the hell out of there as fast as she could, who knows what might have happened.

§

Dani goes back to the hospital the next day, half expecting to find Nico there, but he's not. Instead, she finds Xeno in a room by himself, still groggy from his surgery. The doctor that comes in to check on him informs her that, even though it was a close call and Xeno lost a lot of blood, the knife missed all vital organs, resulting in no permanent damage. The whole time she's there, no-one visits, and it's enough for all of Dani's maternal instincts to kick in, especially when at noon the nurse comes in with a drab-looking plate of hospital food and Xeno eyes it like he might burst into tears. "I'll be back in an hour," she tells him, "don't you dare eat that," and when she does come back, it's with a take-away box of meatballs in tomato sauce and a big slice of apple pie and all the comics she could find in Ray Jay's room.

And so Dani goes back the next day, bearing food and magazines, and the day after that, and the next. At first Xeno doesn't say much to her, apart from "Thank you" or "Please" or "M'am", but his eyes and face light up into a smile every time she walks into the room, which is all the gratification Dani needs. In between she drives back and forth to her practice, attending to her patients, and the facility, where they are dealing with the fall-out from the incident at the club.

Surprising or not, things in that respect work out in their favor. As soon as the press gets wind of what happened, the media circus starts all over again, but this time it's viciously berating the members of the Pittsburgh Vikings that took their homophobia so far a man got put in the hospital because of it. In the slipstream of that a furious public debate begins, demanding more fair play in sports off and on the field.

Rex doesn't quit. At first he's just relieved Xeno will be fine, then he gets angry at the Vikings who targeted him in the first place and in the end he seems to come to terms with the fact that he is now, in fact, the poster boy for LGBT rights in sports. It helps that the team draws even closer together in the face of public scrutiny. In passing, Matt tells Dani that the players have devised a new rule amongst themselves: the incident at the club, the press, and the sexual orientation of Rex - or of any of them, for that matter - stays off the field and out of the locker room. "It's actually amazing," Matt says, "how it's got them all so pent up, but they're like channeling their energy into their game, like they're determined to kick everyone's ass to hell and back and I swear to God, Dani, none of them have ever performed better than they have this week during training." The real test, Dani knows, will be the next game, so she does talk to all the players separately over the next couple of days, sliding in subtle anger management tips for those hotheads that she thinks need it the most.

Weirdly, all through that first part of the week, Nico remains absent. For three full days, he doesn't show up at the facility, he never visits Xeno the hospital and he never once pops up in Dani's car. Dani gets so anxious she nearly asks Coach where the hell he is, but Coach has been looking at her kinda funny, and it makes Dani cringe when she thinks of the reason why, that she was practically _on_ Nico's lap when Coach walked into the waiting room and there was no chance in hell he could have missed the meaning of _that_.

So instead, she asks Xeno about it later that afternoon.

"Oh," the bodyguard tells her while he's munching on the angel wings she baked him, "the boss is on a break, Coach's orders, you know, catching up on some sleep, but he's been here every day!"

"What do you mean?," Dani huffs. "_I_ have been here every day… I haven't seen him once."

"Mmmm… He always comes at midnight."

"At _midnight_?"

"Myeah," Xeno murmurs with his mouth full, throwing her a look.

"And why is he on a break?," Dani asks, already knowing the answer. The last few weeks Nico had been looking dead on his feet, she noticed so herself.

"He's been having trouble sleeping, I think. He never sleeps much, but lately… I'm not sure I'm supposed to say though, but that business with the Pittmans."

"I know," Dani sighs. "It's just that, I… We could have used his help this week, with everything that's going on," but even as she's saying it, Dani knows that's not what she really means.

Xeno throws her another quizzical look. "But Dr Santino, the boss is always there when he's really needed. You just need to call him, or text him. You know that, don't you?"

For a while they're both quiet. Xeno's playing with the pastry left on his plate, a little nervously.

"He saved me, you know," Xeno then says quietly. "Back in the day, it was just me and my mom and my brother. The South Bronx was still a bad neighborhood then, but our mom, she was great, you know. Kept me and my brother on the straight and narrow, kept us tight. She taught me how to cook - banana pancakes, flatbread pizza, cheese-steaks." Xeno smiles. "Your cooking reminds me of her. When she died, things got bad fast. My brother was older, and I was 16 so I got to live with him, but pretty soon he fell in with this bad crowd, and then… Well, for a while, so did I. I did some things I'm not proud of. This one night, my brother and some of his gang decide to rob a liquor store and they put me on stake-out, but everything goes wrong cause the owner of that place has a gun and he chases them into the streets and we're all running and then out of nowhere this guy pops up and just floors me - and I know I've seen him before, you know, in our neighborhood, and I think, that's it. I'm going in now. I'm 17 years old and I'm going to jail. But instead he just gets me to my feet, and he gives me a look and asks me if this is what I want the rest of my life to be, and if I think that that's what my mom would have wanted for her boys. I swear, Dr Santino, that almost had me bawling like a baby. "Your brother," he says to me, "is a lost cause. There's nothing I can do for him. You, you can come work for me. It'll be better money than anything you can rob or steal on the streets, and safer." I've been with him every day since, Dr Santino, and he's never once let me down. He really is one of the good guys. The best, if you ask me."

Dani is so moved by Xeno's story that she doesn't quite know what to say, so she just pats his hand a little, and gives him a big hug when it's time to go, and she drives home feeling shaky, yet strangely unsurprised at this additional proof of Nico's capacity for kindness.

§

Thursday, as Dani's leaving the facility, Coach reminds her about the fundraiser gala the Hawks are hosting the next evening and that her presence is required. Dani is cursing underneath her breath, because in the middle of all the turmoil, she had in fact forgotten about it. She makes a mental note to herself to go dress-shopping the next morning - the event is black tie and also a big deal, since all the sponsors will be there, and a lot of press, and with the team getting so much attention the evening has to be nothing if not perfect.

She's still thinking about dresses when she walks into Xeno's hospital room and finds Nico and Xeno playing a game of poker on his bed, Nico sitting in a chair next to it, laughing. Immediately the tension in the room grows so thick you could slice it with a knife. Dani has to stop herself from taking a step back and running out again, but instead she forces a smile and reluctantly sits down in the chair on the other side of the bed.

"Dr Santino," Nico says, "how nice of you to join us. I hear you've been saving this one from the ordeal of hospital food with some - and I'm quoting here - insanely good cooking." Nothing in his manner betrays anything about what happened the last time they saw each other.

"Uh-huh," Dani mutters, feeling her ears pinking up. "So, where have _you_ been?"

"I've been sleeping, mostly," Nico says coolly, drawing another card. "Coach assured me things were under control, and I'm sure he would have called me if I was needed."

"Oh, okay," Dani says, biting her tongue. "You do look… rested." He looks _good_, Dani thinks. _Sexy_, clad in tight black jeans that sat low on his hips a button up light blue shirt that he rolled up at the sleeves, revealing strong, muscular underarms. Even his perpetual, annoying little smirk was back. It grows a little wider just as Dani catches herself ogling him, and when he looks up briefly, a hint of amusement in his eyes, Dani feels like she's just been caught with her hand in the cookie-jar.

Xeno scrapes his throat, looking from Dani to Nico and back like he's watching an extremely exciting ping-pong match. "You know, I'd leave the room if I could, but eh, I can't even really leave the bed, so…"

"That's alright," Dani mumbles, hoping she's not blushing profusely like a dumb teenager. "I just came to give you this - she takes yet another Tupperware box from her bag and puts it on Xeno's bedside table - but I really should be getting home to Linds."

Nico follows her to the door and outside into the hallway and stops her there. His hand grabs her wrist, sliding down, and then curls his index finger around hers, until they are holding hands in some small way, and Dani can't even begin to explain the way her heart clutches in her chest, to feel Nico clinging.

"We need to talk," Nico says, softness in his expression. "About us," he adds, as if that was something that needed to be clarified.

Dani nods, nervous. She didn't feel this 16 when she was 16. "Linds is going to Ray's tomorrow and tomorrow's the fundraiser thingie and I still need to get a dress," she says, babbling now, "so maybe, ehm, Saturday?"

"Saturday's fine," Nico says. They're just staring at each other in the hallway of the hospital, their fingers still laced together, both silent as the realization that, maybe, _they're what's happening _sinks in. Dani must be looking terrified, because the expression on Nico's face grows even softer, before he whispers 'hey, come here' and draws her into his arms. Immediately Dani's overwhelmed, dizzy with the sensation of being enveloped by him, like she's melting into him. Nico's arms crush her against the flat of his chest, one hand coming to rest in her hair, as she buries her face in the crook of his neck, taking in his smell, his warmth in small, shaky gasps of breath. "Just breathe," Nico whispers somewhere near the top of her head, but Dani hears his heart beating wildly in his chest, betraying he's every bit as affected as she is. Nico plants one kiss in her hair before he unfolds himself and takes a step back, looking at her like he wants to do a whole lot more, but he just squeezes her hand, says "I'll see you tomorrow at the fundraiser" and disappears back into Xeno's room.


	11. Chapter 11

_Author's note: and another one, I'm on a roll. Bit shorter this time, but I need to break up what happens at the gala into several installments and I'm sorry I'm being such a tease, but I just like the tiny cliffhangers too much. We ARE slowly creeping towards the finish though, but first Gabrielle Pittman of course tries to come between Dani and Nico. _

The next morning, Dani lets herself be talked into buying the skimpiest, reddest dress the universe has ever seen by an overzealous shop assistant who swears every single guy at the fundraiser, including the gay ones, will trip over himself if she wears it. Dani thinks she may not be half wrong, as she looks in the mirror - she does look ridiculously hot in it, albeit almost half naked. Her hesitation in buying it gets trumped when she remembers Nico will be at the fundraiser, and the anticipation of his reaction to it becomes simply too tempting to resist.

Her mother does her hair - it's one of the few things Dani can actually trust her with, and anyway, Dani has always liked the feeling of her mother's hands in her hair untangling her tangles, talking aimlessly about some of their lunatic family members. Dani's mother has finally decided to erase all memory and reference to both Ray and Matt out of their lives, talking around them like they never existed in the first place, filling in the blanks with banal chatter and speculating on which of her friends has a nice boy her age.

"Boy?," Dani asks. "You know I'm like _forty_, right?"

Her mother shoves her head back down, frowning.

"You're _thirty-eight_, Danielle… And it's far too young to be closing up shop. I disapprove. Plenty more fish out there!"

Dani wisely decides to tell her mother absolutely nothing about Nico, especially as the image of the two of them in a room together kind of makes her sick to her stomach.

Dani drives herself to the fundraiser. Coach had drilled Dani on a list of people she was required to find and make small talk with, and Dani wanders into the ballroom - jeez, it's an actual fucking ballroom; silk everywhere - seizes the nearest flute of champagne she can find for courage, and goes for it.

She steels herself through small talk with representatives from Pepsi, GM, FedEx and their wives. Out of the corner of her eye she sees most of the players wander in, and Coach and his wife and then Matt, followed closely by a now very pregnant Noelle. It's the first time she sees Noelle since she and Matt broke up before the summer, and the shock she expected to feel remains, to her infinite gratitude, absent. Then Dani hears a whistle - T.K., who else? - and when she turns to the door, she sees Rex and Jim. Somewhere, someone starts applauding, and pretty soon the whole room follows suit, leaving Jim and Rex nothing to do but smile (uncomfortably, Dani notices) and take a bow. Dani is about to go to their rescue when there's a touch at her elbow.

Dani feels her body tilting, magnetized, weight shifting onto her back leg, and she says, "Nico", chin going up so she can catch his eyes as she moves. To a casual bystander, Nico's features would betray nothing out of the ordinary, but Dani's learned to read his micro-expressions well by now. That's how she does catch the ultrafast stolen glance up and down her body, and the resulting slight twitch at the corner of his mouth, the way his eyes go a little glassy.

_Mission accomplished_, she thinks, as Nico smiles at her, says, "Good evening, Dr Santino. You look… _incredible_."

Dani winks at him, happily. "Good evening to you, Mr Careles," she says, and she can't quite glance away from him to look round the rest of the ballroom anymore - its flotilla of sponsors and media moguls and football players.

"You know, I think it best I stay close to you this evening in case something goes wrong," Nico quips.

"Jeez, Nico, considering the Hawks' recent history, what on _earth_ could possibly go wrong?!"

"Well, for starters, I think that dress you're wearing is going to bring several of the older, less vital men here tonight to the brink of a heart attack," and he offers her his arm, just as his face breaks into a wide grin.

Dani's blushing and grinning simultaneously, but she slips her hand into the comfortable notch of his elbow anyway, ignoring T.K. making leering, goofy faces at them as he walks by.

Nico looks like he fell out of a Hugo Boss add, with a black bow tie and vest, looking extremely dapper and handsome as fuck in the soft yellow light of the ballroom. They discuss Xeno (going home on Monday), they talk about the press (bordering on insane), and how T.K.'s been behaving of late (much better, but in many ways still completely an overgrown toddler).

It's the same small talk as before, but also completely different, and all of Dani's smiles bloom out into giggles, and Nico's eyes sparkle brightly.

They pause to swap out empty champagne flutes, Nico leaning to the left a little, blocking her view on Matt and Noelle, who are talking amiably to some sponsors. Dani has no doubt Nico does it on purpose, and she says, quietly, against the rim of her glass, "You really don't need to do that, Nico, it's fine."

Nico looks a bit lost for a second before he collects himself enough to ask: "It is?"

"Yes," Dani answers, truthfully. "I bear Matt no grudges - he did the decent thing, what he had to do, and in the end it probably worked out for the best. I'm glad we can be civil to each other and I really hope we'll all be friends again somewhere in the future."

Nico's gazing at her like she's a miracle unfolding right before his very eyes and out of nowhere a thought pops into Dani's head, something she'd been meaning to ask but never got a chance to and then forgot.

"Mind if I ask you something?"

"Go ahead."

"This summer, when Lindsay and I were in Paris visiting Ray Jay and Juliette, were you there?"

This time Nico's so surprised he can't even hide it. "Now, why would you ask me that?"

"Because I saw you, didn't I? Standing on that bridge over the Seine? Don't lie, Nico. A lie by omission is still a lie."

"Okay, I was there. Yes," Nico sighs.

"Were you following me?," Dani asks, not sure if she should find that arousing, endearing or just really very creepy.

"No, Dani, I wasn't following _you_. I was in Paris because… Look, I didn't think you needed to know about this… I have… _associates_… When Juliette texted me the night she and Ray Jay left for Paris, I put one of them in play over there to keep an eye on them. You know, just as a precaution. To make sure they weren't going to get in any trouble. I just happened to be there for a debrief on the day you and Lindsay flew in, that's all."

"Oh," Dani says, a little confused, wondering if she should be angry at the presumptuous way Nico keeps tabs on all of their lives, including that of her son, and then finds that she's exactly the opposite. Somehow it's a comfort that no matter where, no matter how, someone always has their backs, especially when that someone is Nico, who she trusts with her life. So instead of berating him, Dani stands on tiptoe and presses a warm, grateful kiss to his cheek, whispering "Thank you" against his skin. It's when she wants to step back, that Nico slides his hand to her waist, holding her firmly into his personal space. The sudden contact sets all sorts of feelings alight inside Dani. Their eyes lock, Nico's face so close, as he asks, dangerously "Now do I get a question too?"

Dani can only gasp a "Yes", because she can feel herself go hot from the inside out with the way he closes the inches between them, until she's pressed tightly enough against him to feel the buttons on his vest, the firm strength of him.

"Am I right in thinking -" and here Nico leans in, head dipping lower, his mouth brushing near the skin next to her ear, until Dani is shivering, feeling her breath catch and her breasts tighten and knowing they're pressed up so close he knows it, too, "- that you wore that dress for _me_, tonight?' he whispers to her, murmurs it softly on a hot breath into the shell of her ear. Dani thinks she might just spontaneously combust in his grasp, knows she's clutching at the front of his shirt now, knows it's only a matter of minutes, or seconds, before people around them will begin to notice.

"Oh God, Nico," Dani moans, "we can't… People…", which instantly snaps Nico out of it, and makes him let go of Dani, seemingly composed but for the feral glint that still lingers in his brown eyes.

"I'm sorry," he says, looking flustered, which is such an unusual look for him Dani needs to suppress a smile, and she's about to say something ridiculous, when Nico makes a noise of profound irritation - eyes sliding away from her to the other end of the room. Dani tracks his gaze all the way to Gabrielle Pittman, who's just entered the room, looking haughty and also impossibly stunning, in a dress that's even more revealing than the one Dani's wearing.

"Here comes trouble," Dani says, after a beat and gently.

Nico slants a look at her. "I'm afraid so, yes."

Dani slides her fingers on the fabric of his vest, and quietly tells him, "Go on then. Better deal with it now."

He doesn't go, not immediately, just looks at her. "I'll try to be be fast about it," he says, half-turning on his heels, but then Dani calls him back by saying his name and she's not sure why she does it, though she does suspects Gabrielle Pittman is a factor, when she says, sweetly, "The answer to your question was yes, by the way," and then walks away first so she doesn't get to see the stunned, aroused look on his face.


	12. Chapter 12

Dani flees to the safe heaven that is Rex and Jim, who are flanked by several of the players in an attempt to block them from too many intrusions of journalists and sponsors. She sees Nico cornering Gabrielle on the other side of the room, Gabrielle smiling at Nico like she's a cat that just got at the milk. Dani's not quite prepared for the wave of sickening, angry jealousy that hits her right in the pit of her stomach, so she turns her back to them, not wanting to see.

Jim offers her another glass of champagne, and Dani thinks she might get drunk soon if she doesn't start counting them. T.K. joins them too, with a new girlfriend in tow that Dani's sure won't last a week, seeing as T.K. looks so bored he basically ignores the girlfriend and talks to Dani instead. It's actually fun after a while. Dani knows most of the players about as well as she does her own kids by now, and it's nice to hang out with them and laugh with them about things that don't necessarily have to do with their game. _Admit that it's also nice to be around all those hot, young bodies who all adore you, Santino!_, she hears Jeanette teasing her inside her head, which has her grinning, because of course, that is true as well.

T.K. insists on dancing with her, which, as it turns out, consists of twirling and sweeping her around the floor like she's some kind of human yoyo, until she's so out of breath and giggling so hard she has to quit, making her way towards the bar for a much needed soda, T.K. shouting after her that's he's not even shown her half of his killer moves yet. She's till laughing, sipping her soda, when a woman slips in next to her and then she's suddenly eye to eye with Gabrielle Pittman.

"Dr Santino," Gabrielle says in greeting, glancing slyly at her. "I am so pleased to see you again. And don't you look… _darling_." It's flawlessly cruel and venomous, but Dani's not ready to take the bait - yet.

"Mrs Pittman. I'm surprised to see you here," she says, although she's more surprised that Nico let Gabrielle venture out of his sights. She glances quickly around the room, which prompts Gabrielle to say, "Oh, Nico had other urgent business to attend to. One of the players got a little too drunk, so Nico's escorting him of the premises to make sure he doesn't bring shame to the Hawks' good name. I'm sure he'll be right back."

_Yes_, Dani thinks, _and I'm sure you'll use his absence to do as much damage as possible here tonight_, but she's forcing a smile, determined to remain polite. Out of the corner of her eye, Dani sees Matt moving in, his face asking her if he needs to cut in and rescue her. Dani shakes her head at him in what she hopes is a subtle gesture, but of course nothing escapes Gabrielle Pittman, who looks behind her shoulder to see Matt moving away from them again, towards where Noelle is standing.

"Oh yes, Mr Donnally. I heard about him and Noelle Saris." Gabrielle shakes her head at Dani in mock-empathy. "It _is_ hard, isn't it? For women our age. Always someone younger and prettier on the horizon," and the way Gabrielle says it, leaves little doubt in Dani's mind that Gabrielle considers it not so much to be her own problem, but mostly Dani's.

"That's not how it was. And not all men are like that," Dani says, defiantly.

"Oh, don't be so naive, Dr Santino. In my experience, some men may _appear_ to be different, but they're really not."

Gabrielle's smiling at Dani, predatory, her eyes eating everything up, and Dani is suddenly aware that she's several inches smaller, and that her skin or her body are nowhere near as perfect as Gabrielle's and that her dress seems tacky and bland in comparison to the one that Gabrielle is wearing, which probably costs more than Dani's car does.

"What are you trying to say here, Gabrielle," she asks, working hard to keep her voice steady and only half succeeding.

"Just a friendly warning, Dr Santino. You know, us women, we should stick together. I just thought you would like to know, especially after what happened with your ex-husband, that our mutual friend may not actually be as decent and wonderful as he has led you to believe."

Dani's face burns with barely suppressed fury. She knows she should have walked away ages ago, she knows Gabrielle Pittman is poison, but the sneer at Ray's cheating rattles her - _how could Gabrielle know? Could Nico have told her? The reason for her divorce isn't exactly common knowledge in Hawks circles and she knows for a fact that Matt has only barely ever spoken to Gabrielle._ "Just say it, already," she hisses at Gabrielle, with a barely banked violence.

Gabrielle laughs, oozing with satisfaction as she hovers closer to Dani. "Such temperament! I can see why all these men like you so much. But you know, I might be wrong. You probably already know Nico's sleeping with Vera Dade, the League-investigator, right? Or did he forget to mention it?," Gabrielle goes on, favoring Dani with an innocent smile that Dani wishes she could claw right off Gabrielle's face.

"I know more than you think," Dani says, but even in her own ears it sounds lame and untrue, and then she's excusing herself, Gabrielle's triumphant laughter ringing in her ears as she makes it past the dance floor towards the bar, where she orders a Long Island Iced Tea that she downs in one. Dani's contemplating having another, and then she's contemplating going home, but just as she's about to make a quick getaway, Nico pops up by her side.

Dani jolts, scowls at him. "Jeez. Nico!"

"I'm sorry," he says, with a smile, but also an inquisitive lift of his eyebrows. "You're not leaving, are you? I still need to dance with you..."

"Nico, I don't know. I'm really very tired."

"Nonsense," he says, nearly dragging her onto the floor. Dani believes she might be a little drunk now - that Long Island was a whopper. Not drunk enough to not be able to dance though. It is hot and hazy being surrounded by so many people, but all Dani can really concentrate on is the feeling of being held by him, moving together, even with the words of Gabrielle Pittman still echoing inside her head. It doesn't help that Otis Redding's These Arms of Mine starts sounding through the speakers either. Stupid Coach and his damn' soul-collection.

Nico shifts a little closer, moves his mouth to her ear. "You know, you're pretty good at this."

Feeling his breath against her neck makes Dani blush again. "You're very nice."

"I'm really not _that_ nice," he goes on, and there is that dangerous edge in his voice.

"Yes," Dani mutters, "Gabrielle told me."

"Gabrielle… wait, what?!" Nico grounds them to a halt, takes a step back. "Gabrielle talked to you? When?"

"Just now," Dani answers, "when you were taking care of whatever you were taking care of."

Nico scans the room until he finds Gabrielle standing in a corner, looking over at them with that sly smile, surrounded by a bunch of rich looking men. "Dani, whatever she told you, you must know that chances are it's probably exaggerated or simply not true, right?"

"Okay," Dani whispers, barely audible above the noises of the dance floor. "So you're _not_ sleeping with Vera Dade?"

Nico grits his teeth in unconcealed irritation. "Gabrielle told you _that_?"

"She did, yes." Dani blinks her eyes a couple of times, swallows, feeling more than a little lost all of a sudden.

"I was," Nico says, very seriously. "I'm not anymore."

Dani nods at him, allows herself to be swept onto the dance floor once again, but her mind is reeling, tension settling in her arms and shoulders. Nico never lies. It's what he always says, she tells herself. Yet right now, she can't help not feeling so sure. She let Gabrielle get under her skin, she realizes, with the comment about Ray, her air of I-know-so-many-things-you-don't.

"Dani, please," Nico's voice sounds somewhere near the top of her head. "You need to loosen up a little. Don't let her get inside your head."

Dani's throat makes a noise that is in between a laugh and a groan, but she tries, and they're dancing, and then it's like Nico's body just syncs with hers, pressing closer and closer still until all coherent thought starts leaving her head.

Nico's quiet for a very long time, just guides her through dance after dance, until the silence grows too dense, and he lets out an exasperated sigh. "Dani… Why do I always feel like I'm taking you out of your comfort zone?' His voice sounds softer than Dani has ever heard it.

'I don't know, Nico,' Dani deadpans. Then, more close to the truth, she says, 'I've probably been out of my comfort zone since the day I met you.'

Nico shifts a little, so he can look her in the eye, his own burning. "We really do need to have that talk. Soon, Dani."

"Yes," Dani agrees, "but now is really _not_ the time," and she closes her eyes in frustration at the sight of Gabrielle Pittman making her way over to them.

"Mind if I cut in for a second?", Gabrielle asks Danielle, voice dripping with honey.

"You can _not_ be serious," Nico hisses between his teeth. "Didn't I ask you to leave like an hour ago?"

"But I don't want to leave," Gabrielle pouts, ugly - making Dani wonder what on earth Marshall Pittman _and_ Nico ever saw in her - "I may not own the Hawks anymore, but they still feel like my team and I want to show my support in their time of need. Really, Nico, it can't hurt to dance with an old friend, can it?"

"And what if I say no?", Nico says, avoiding Gabrielle's gaze and looking at Dani instead.

"Come on, now. You don't want me to make a scene now, do you? Certainly not tonight?"

Dani's the first to give in, throwing up her arms in surrender and taking a few steps back. She immediately wishes she hadn't, because it causes Gabrielle to say, "See, she's _sweet_. Isn't she sweet, Nico?", and it makes her want to kiss Nico right then and there, just to show Gabrielle Pittman she won't be messed with. Then she becomes aware that their little get-together is under close scrutiny of at least a dozen people in the room; Coach and Matt, several of the trainers, even T.K., who's not smiling, but looking apprehensive as if shit might be about to blow. Dani's really not left with any other choice than to step off the dance floor, shrugging like she doesn't care, and moving to a corner with T.K. following closely on her heels.

"Dr D, what's up? What is _she_ doing here?"

"It's so complicated, T.K. I can't even begin to explain."

"Yeah, well, whatever it is, Nico looks like he's about to kill her, man."

They both look over and Dani sees T.K.'s got a point; Nico's face is set on thunder and he's keeping Gabrielle at arm's length, yet at the same time they look good together, and the idea that they must have danced together so many times in the past is enough to catapult Dani's mood straight below zero degrees. Finally fed up, she's not even trying to hide how she's feeling, as she heads for the exit and then heads home.

_Txt message - Nico, 3.12 am_

I'm sorry, Dani. Can we still talk tomorrow? Nx

_Txt message - Dani, 3.21 am_

Yes. I'll find you after practice.

_Txt message - Dani, 3.27 am_

x


	13. Chapter 13

_Author's note: Alright, one more very angsty chapter and then I'll post the last one (and the epilogue) somewhere tomorrow. Reviews would be nice and thank you all so much for reading. Kx_

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In the morning, Dani feels weak and miserably anxious. She's sorry Lindsey is out of the house, because at least if she were there, it would give Dani some distraction. Now it's just her and silence and hours that still stretch between herself and meeting with Nico, and no matter how hard Dani tries to drag out her shower, and her breakfast and reading the newspaper, it's like time won't move forward at all. She tries reading the latest Ken Follett novel, but the words keep blurring on the page because her thoughts keep straying to Nico, wondering what he's going to say, what she's going to say. For so long now, they've struck a careful balance between becoming friends and running circles of denial around their desire, but ever since the night Xeno got stabbed the balance has tipped. All week, tiny steps down the path that had no turning, until Dani was ready - almost ready - to fall, or to jump off that cliff. Even so, Gabrielle's words keep coming back like glue as well. _He's not as decent and wonderful as he has led you to believe. _Dani knows it's not fair. That in all the time she's known him, Nico has not only never let her down, he's also never been anything but nice. Now, Dani also realizes that he would never have kissed her _just because_ - knows Nico values their friendship way too much to jeopardize it over a heated whim of the moment. If Nico had decided to kiss her, it was because - mentally - he was already there, on the edge of that cliff, ready and just waiting for her to catch up and take his hand, so they could jump together. _How could she not have seen this then? _Dani lets the silence around her eat away at the oxygen in the room for a while, wonders briefly if maybe she should call Jeanette and then decides against it. As much as Dani loves her friend, she knows Jeanette will wind her up even more and if her knees start feeling any weaker or if the adrenaline starts rushing even harder, Dani thinks she might throw up before she's halfway out the door. So, Dani starts cooking. Not just cooking; Dani takes everything that sits inside her fridge and makes enough food to last a dozen families two whole winters, until her kitchen is filled with baked rigatoni and potpies and macaroni and cheese and she's sweating like a sinner in church. Typically, she then almost runs late, but at least she feels better and more composed as she's parking her car on the Hawks' parking lot.

§

Practice is just over and so Dani has to make her way through a lot of tired and grumpy looking players, most of them still nursing hangovers from the night before. She looks for Nico in the meeting room, and in Coach's office, and assuming he's still on the field, makes her way over there.

Nico _is_ on the field, but he's not alone.

Dani freezes on the spot when she sees him talking to the woman she recognizes as Vera Dade. They're standing several yards away on the sideline, huddled together like they have something very important to talk about. Nico's got his back to Dani, and hasn't seen her yet, which is fine because for a while she can't really move. Gabrielle's in her head again, saying, "_You probably already know Nico's sleeping with Vera Dade, the League-investigator, right? Or did he forget to mention it?_", and she's shrugging it away, angry, reminding herself she's an adult and there's nothing wrong with Nico talking to an old flame, especially when there's still a professional relationship that needs to be maintained. The one step Dani takes towards them then falters again, because in that same moment Vera leans into him, spreading a hand possessively over Nico's arm. There is a pounding in Dani's ears that comes out of nowhere. The grass feels like it's disappearing from underneath her feet. 'You can't,' she thinks, but no words come out of her mouth. Dani just can't move. When she does move, it's enough to attract Vera's attention, who looks up, her mouth falling open and Nico's spinning round, but so has Dani - walking, running off the field as fast as she can in stiletto's, ignoring him as he shouts "Danii" and "No!". Somewhere in the hallway, she manages to yank off her shoes, so she can run to her car faster, not caring about the way the hard ground is digging into the soles of her feet.

§

Dani runs straight to Dr Gunner's office on campus, who takes one look at her face, swollen from tears she cried in the car, mutters "Oh my" and ushers her quickly inside. She slumps on the couch, face breaking, everything breaking, little cracks first, before the collapse comes at light speed. Dr Gunner barely has time to put a comforting arm around Dani before she's shaking, a wet torrent of tears gushing out of her, a wave of panic hitting her so hard she can barely breathe. Dr Gunners's making hushing sounds, says, "Breathe, Danielle, you have to breathe. Slowly. Like this. In… Out… In…" It's an age before Dani stops trembling, before she can stop clutching at Dr Gunner's shirt. When she finally does calm down, he moves away for a minute and comes back with tea and cookies, and a fresh pack of tissues - which ordinarily would have made Dani laugh, but not now, not this time. This - this feeling that she's literally coming apart at the seams, that there's a hole burned inside of her heart - is what she should have felt after Ray, and after Matt - and Dani '_the therapist'_ knows that's probably exactly what that is, that it's all saved up hurt, for being disappointed and hurt and abandoned not once, not twice, but now three times in a row. Dani tries telling Dr Gunner, choking out words and broken sentences about Matt and Noelle, and Nico and Gabrielle, and the fundraiser and what she just saw, but it comes out in fragments, her words all wrong.

"Oh God,' she groans, eventually, "what the hell is wrong with me?"

"Danielle, please. Nothing is wrong with you."

"Then _why_ does this keep happening?"

Dr Gunner shakes his head at her, wearily, like he wants to contradict her. Oddly, he doesn't say anything for a while, but he does move over to his own chair, where he folds his hands together.

"Danielle. As your therapist, it would be unprofessional of me to say any of the things I am going to say to you now. So I'm taking off my therapist's hat and putting on the one that is just your friend. Nothing is wrong with you. Also, there is no _this_. I know it feels that way, in your head right now, that what happened with Ray and Matt and now this is one and the same thing, but it's not. You got hurt by Ray, after you devoted your life to him, put yourself in second place to him - to my utter irritation, I might add - for almost twenty years. But you, Danielle, you wouldn't be you if you hadn't skipped straight over the self-pitying grief towards defiant anger and a stubborn refusal to break down. Which is commendable, I'm not saying that, but somewhere along the way I think you may have actually forgotten to deal with your sadness. You put it away for later. And then came Matt, and again you allow yourself and what you want to come second to what he wanted, and when that falls apart, again, the hurt, filed away for later. Might we start recognizing a pattern here?"

"Maybe, but isn't that what love is? Isn't it always about compromises, when you decide to be with someone? At least that's what _I_ tell my patients."

"I'm sure you're right, Danielle, but to which extent?"

"Healer, heal thyself," she mutters. "God, I don't understand anything right now. Why am I so confused?"

"Tell me something… Are you in love with this Nico?"

"I d… Yes."

"Is it possible you've been having these feeling for him for quite a long time?"

"Maybe… I don't know!"

"Danielle…"

"Okay, okay. Yes!"

"Then what's stopping you?"

Dani blows up. "Are you serious? What's stopping me?! I just saw him with another woman!"

"Ah yes, the woman Nico's sleeping with - according to his ex who hates him so much she faked a criminal charge against him. Tell me again, Danielle; what exactly _did_ you see just now?"

"She had her hand on his arm, and.. and…"

"A hand on his arm. And this tells you what exactly? That he's not telling the truth? That this Vera's still his lover, even when he told you she isn't?"

"Al! I don't know, okay! Leave it alone, please."

"I'm not quite done yet, Danielle. Please, try to explain why what you saw just now is freaking you out so much? Why are you so upset?"

Dani remains silent for a very long time, trying to make sense of the frantic thoughts in her head. Eventually, she whispers, "Because the fall might kill me this time."

"Third time's a charm?", Dr Gunner asks, looking at her kindly.

"It's different. Because this is Nico. Who I still barely know anything about - at least… not the common things, not things like does he have siblings, or where he _lives_ for Christ's sake. And then other times… Sometimes I feel like I can almost understand what he meant, when he said I'm the only one who knows him now. Like, there's this bond, or an understanding, but it's intuitive… It's really hard to explain, I'm sorry."

"That's alright, Danielle. Go on."

"The thing is - nothing about Nico is easy, not like Ray and Matt were easy. Nothing Nico does is shallow, everything is intense underneath all that calculated control. When he's your friend, he's your friend for life, and there's nothing… Ask Xeno."

"And why is that a bad thing exactly?"

"Because the last two guys I was in a relationship with betrayed me, walked away from me and I didn't see it coming? If I didn't see it coming then, will I see it coming now? Can I ever know? I don't know… And Nico being Nico, if _that_ goes bad, it will be the _worst_ kind of bad. I don't think I can go through that again. I don't know if I can handle being torn up any more."

"Finally! - the elephant has left the room."

"Ha. Ha."

"Danielle, not a single person in the world can blame you for having developed some trust issues after what you've been through. But even so, that's the risk. That's _always_ the risk. You love someone, they might not love you back or they might not love you as much or they might stop somewhere along the way. Sometimes you get burned. C'est la vie! You know what therapists always say to patients who've had their hearts broken several times? _Every_ relationship you are in will fail, until _one_ doesn't. Now will you please do me a favor? From what you've told me this Nico doesn't sound like an unreasonable or an unkind guy. Why don't you just talk to him, like you said you would?"


	14. Chapter 14

By the time Dani leaves Dr Gunner's office, it's late, the campus grounds eerily dark as she's making her way to her car. Her vision's still blurred, from the tears she cried, and she longs for her bed, for sleep, for any kind of brief respite from the dull ache that's settled around her heart. Getting into her car, shifting around on her seat and finding Nico sitting there in the passenger's seat, shouldn't have surprised her, not this time, but it does - Dani jumps so hard in her seat she almost bangs her head. It's instinct that makes her get out of the car and take a few steps away from it, turning her back on it, but it's also instinct and maybe kindness and maybe love that makes her stop when she hears the car door slam.

§

'Come here,' Nico says, holding his arms out. Dani falls into them, buries herself against his chest. He lets her. Lightly strokes her hair, places small kisses on the crown of her head.

"Dani, listen to me," he says, quietly. "I am _not_ involved with Vera. What you saw is just how she always behaves, and she'll tell you - if you ask her - that I was just telling her to _stop_. Yes, I was involved with her before - very, _very_ briefly, and it meant nothing, and it stopped… It stopped that night. That night when Marshall turned out to be dead and your fish died too. That night I kissed you. There's been no-one since I kissed you. How could there be?"

Dani unburies herself, her mouth a beautiful silent "oh", which is all the encouragement Nico needs.

"Do you really think I was gonna let you run away from me forever? That I wasn't going to come after you at some point? Let me tell you something; I don't want Vera. I don't want Gabrielle. I fucking don't. I want you. Only you. I know part of you knows this already. And I know you're really just scared. I get it. I understand. Scared is okay. Hell, I'm scared. I haven't felt this way since… probably never. But Dani. I am still. Not. Going. Anywhere." Nico pulls Dani by the collar of her coat, pulls her closer. "I'm in love with you," he says. "I was always totally in love with you. You changed everything. For so long, I was fine with flying solo. But now it's like, I've been in the dark all this time, and, every time you're near me, you turn on the light inside my head. That's what you _do_, Dani, can't you see that?"

She's just staring at him, her eyes still wide and unsure. Nico can see she's struggling to believe him, struggling to believe anything good can happen to her. "Tell you what," he says, playing the very last of his cards. "You tell me, right here and right now, to my face, that you don't feel the same. Tell me you don't love me. You tell me that and I will turn around and walk away and never bother you again."

§

At first there are simply no words in Dani's mind. All there is, is Nico's body pressed against hers, the smell of him, his face, the sweetest, loveliest… She tries picturing how he will walk away, how he will slowly disappear out of sight, how she will be left there alone. Then the words tumble out. "Nico. I can't tell you I don't love you." Dani falters, shaken by the intensity of his eyes, the hunger and the love she sees in them.

"Say it. Please," Nico urges, his voice a cracked whimper.

"I love you. I do." It is all Dani can say before her throat closes up completely, but it is all Nico needs. He lunges at her, hands grabbing her head, her hair and then finally, finally kissing her. Dani tastes coffee and menthol on his lips and something that is uniquely him. His tongue pushes in, tasting her, mapping out the inside of his mouth, before his teeth close to tug on her lower lip. It feels so much like her whole body is trapped inside his mouth.

§

Nico kisses her like he's been dying to, because he has. Dani's mouth tastes like everything he's ever missed, tea and sugar and spice, sweet and lush and he wants to have her here, right now. She's wrapped around him, whimpers when he pulls away to kiss her cheeks, her jaw, down the exquisite line of her neck. Recklessly, he whispers how he's going to put his mouth all over her for hours, until he can't see or smell or taste anything but her. Dani grips his hair and gasps, hips rocking against his until he goes cross-eyed with how badly he wants her.

§

Afterwards, Dani has very little recollection of how they managed to get from the campus to her house. She vaguely remembers Nico insisted on driving, and being cuddled up against him, and that she bit his ear and breathed into it, relishing the sharp intake of his breath as she did that and the small hissing sound he made.

The next thing Dani knows, they are falling on her sofa. "Dani," Nico breathes against her mouth, "if you don't want things to be moving this fast, now would be the time to stop me." She replies by kissing him greedily.

Nico pushes her back onto the sofa, keeping her there at arm's length. His eyes turn to burning fever, as he takes his sweet time to look her body up and down - still fully clothed. His hand slides over her face, brush her hair back and then he rests his fingers against her bottom lip. Dani realizes he is mimicking their moment in the hospital, and, eager to return the pleasure, she takes his hand, pouts her lips and lets his finger slip inside. She licks over it, swirls her tongue against it and then starts sucking. Slowly first, then harder, tongue rasping over the top, flashing her eyes at him as she does so. He is panting and Dani enjoys that he makes no effort at all to hide she is making him horny as hell.

"Jezus," Nico moans, "do you have any idea what you are doing to me?"

"I can guess," Dani smiles. She lifts herself up, kisses him gently on the lips and then trails one hand down over his chest, along his ribs, over his stomach. She inches back to look at his face as her hand finds the swell of his cock straining hotly against the fabric of his trousers. She uses one finger to slide up and down his length, before slowly circling the head with her thumb. Nico's eyes are fluttering, and the sound he makes seems barely human. Dani then stops, waiting for him to make the next move.

He pounces at her, eyes full of bloodlust. He drags her off the sofa onto the soft rug - I'm not fucking you on there, I'm not 17', he growls - his use of the word fuck making her half-mad with anticipation. With some violence and no consideration they get rid of each other's clothes in no time. Nico squints, gasps, as he sees her naked breasts, her stomach, everything, for the first time. He takes her hands and holds them down next to her head and then - so fast it's Dani's turn to gasp - slides over her and enters her in one fluent thrust. Dani tries to free her hands to touch him, as an immense wave of pure pleasure sweeps through her body at feeling him inside her - but Nico just tuts and smiles wickedly, keeping her pinned down.

A lamp casts faint shadows across their bodies, silhouettes them in amber glow, as he starts thrusting into her slowly, still pinning her arms and hands down under his. He seems to know exactly what he is doing, building it up to a steady rhythm, and keeping it there. Each time he thrusts, the melting point deep inside Dani becomes more sensitive, exploding heavenly sensations to every centimeter of her body, all the way down to her toes. Only a few minutes of that, and she is turned into nothing but wide open whimpering lust. "Nico, please," she moans against his face, "I don't want to come yet, I want this to last."

Nico just laughs a low hum, pushes into her a little harder, making her yelp, before he leans in and whispers in her ear, "don't worry, baby, we won't do this just once." Then he moves his head lower, where he sucks one nipple harshly into his mouth and then the next, until the pressure inside Dani builds to almost painful levels. Nico feels it too and he comes up to bury his tongue in her mouth, fucking her a little faster and harder now, then breaks the kiss. "Come on, Dani, come for me, baby," he says into her mouth, and that is all Dani can take. Her orgasm pounds through her body, as she arches her back off the ground, clenching around him as he keeps thrusting. She thinks she is screaming, but she can't be sure, because for at least some time everything fades and she can only hold on to him desperately.

All the while, Nico stays half on top of her and inside of her, raining kisses on every bit of skin he can reach, until she comes down enough to kiss him again, tongues gently battling against each other. Dani brackets her legs behind Nico's, whispers "please" and "more" against his mouth. There's a slight hesitation, and looking at him Dani thinks she understands why. Nico looks undone, like he's barely hanging on to the last shred of his control, pupils blown and wide open, vulnerable - and in that moment, if there was still doubt in Dani's mind about loving him, it's gone, because she loves him then with such intense zeal it's a surprise she's even breathing. "It's okay," she murmurs against his mouth. "You can do anything you like," meaning it, and then he's moving again, and crashing his mouth down on hers until she can taste blood. He's relentless: touches, caresses, slaps, tweaks, scratches, rubs, scrawls, all over her body, but Dani's not afraid and she feels no pain, only pleasure. She starts coming again, shouting his name now, and then he is there too, swearing and clawing at her, until it becomes impossible to tell who is trembling the hardest.

Nico lets himself roll of her onto the rug, taking her half with him, arms and legs entangled and they just lie there, trying to catch some breath. He looks at her in awe. "Wow," he says. "You are…"

"All yours," Dani whispers back and she sees how that hits him, moves him. A tiny smile plays with the corners of his mouth as he says, in a soft-wonder voice, "I'm pretty sure I want everything with you, Dr Danielle Santino, and I don't mean just sex." Dani smiles back, a deep smile that wells up within her, as the knowledge begins to bloom that her life is about to dramatically change.


	15. Epilogue

Nico wakes first, the morning after. Dani's lying on her side, with her back to him, and Nico can't help a smile, once all the memories of their night of passionate love making flow back into his mind. Kissing her neck to wake her, to continue where they left off, is so very tempting, but they've hardly slept and he does think Dani needs the rest. He goes downstairs, where his clothes are still scattered on the floor, dresses and wanders into the kitchen.

If Nico was in any way poetic, he could have voiced something about the sense of wonder he was feeling, of falling in love again, something he honestly believed would never happen to him again. And how it was almost surreal, that this person around whom his whole world had begun to turn, actually existed.

But Nico's not a poet. If anything he's sparse with his words, with the amount of them he's willing to use. He has said all he needed to say to Dani yesterday and has shown her everything after. Still, as he is looking outside of the kitchen window, into the garden where autumn leaves are flying and dancing in the wind, on this day that really is just a day like any other, there isn't a single part of him that doesn't understand everything is different from now on. That from now on, his life will be divided into time spent with her and time spent without her. He can't look into the future, but in a way he already knows. That he'll consider her to be his wife long before he asks her to marry him - which won't even be that long. That she'll be his lover and his best friend, his late nights and home-cooked meals and mornings in bed and talks about football. That in time, he'll learn every curve of her body blind and will love her kids and that he'll still sneak up on her every chance he gets, just to hear that half-exasperated, half-amused groan one more time.

What he does know, and knows completely, on that windy Autumn morning, is that she got hurt, and that she was lonely, and as it turned out, so was he, and that he already loves her more than anything or anyone he has ever loved before. Somehow, this doesn't make him nervous anymore. If anything, he is impatient, to get on with it, to start _this_. He will make coffee and then wake her up, Nico thinks, and heads towards the coffee machine. He's just about to fetch cups from a top drawer when he feels Dani wrap her arms around his torso - something he'll never tire off, starting in that moment.

'Mmm, smell of coffee woke me.'

'Hey! You snuck up on me. That's supposed to be my job.'

"I know. Come back to bed."

"I'm already dressed, Dr Santino." Teasing her now.

"I know. Come back to bed."

"It will be midday soon. When is Lindsay coming home?"

"Tomorrow morning. We have all day. Come back to bed."

In the end, Nico does go back to bed.

—-

THE END


End file.
